JP5159866B2 - Egg alignment device - Google Patents

Description

The present invention relates to an egg aligning device, and more particularly to an egg aligning device that aligns eggs transported at irregular intervals on the transport unit at equal intervals in the width direction of the transport unit.

In general, packed eggs sold at retail stores, etc. are collected in the poultry house, and then go through a washing / drying process, an inspection process for inspecting dirt, cracks, etc., and a sorting process for selecting eggs according to size. Packed and shipped to retail stores. Since these processes are almost automated by systematization, the eggs collected in the poultry house are transported while being transferred to a conveyor suitable for each process.

Eggs transported from the poultry house are transported at irregular intervals on the conveyor for collecting eggs. In order to efficiently wash and dry in the cleaning / drying process and to inspect accurately in the inspection process, it is necessary to transport the eggs continuously at equal intervals. It must be transferred to an endless roller conveyor that can transport eggs.

In order to transfer the eggs on the endless roller conveyor at equal intervals, the eggs need to be aligned. In order to align the eggs that are conveyed at irregular intervals on the conveyor, the sorting plates may be provided at a predetermined interval along the conveying direction of the conveyor.

For example, in order to align hen eggs conveyed at irregular intervals in six rows, the interval is such that large hen eggs can pass through five sorting plates along the egg conveying direction. As described above, six rows of passages may be formed on the conveyor.

However, some of the eggs that are transported from the upstream at irregular intervals inevitably collide with the upstream end of the sorting plate, and the eggs are broken or cracked due to the impact. Furthermore, since the passage formed by the dividing plate is only wide enough to allow large eggs to pass through, the eggs may overlap each other at the entrance. Once clogging has occurred, it is difficult to resolve it naturally, so the egg transported from the upstream may collide with the clogged egg at the entrance of the passage, resulting in broken eggs and cracks.

In addition, since the eggs are transported one after another from the upstream, even if only one passage is clogged at first, the eggs that have stopped flowing in that passage will flow to other passages, and over time will reach other passages. Clogging spreads. When multiple passages were clogged at the same time, there was hardly any natural solution, so it was necessary to stop the conveyor and manually remove the eggs stuck at the entrance of the passage.

Therefore, a soft synthetic resin rocking rod is provided at the upstream end of the plurality of sorting plates, and the rocking rods are swung left and right or back and forth to push the eggs apart to prevent clogging of the eggs generated at the entrance of the passage. An egg alignment apparatus that automatically resolves has been proposed (see Patent Document 1).

Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 04-12928

However, in the conventional egg alignment apparatus described in Patent Document 1, since the swinging rod is formed of a soft synthetic resin pipe, there is no risk that the egg will be damaged by contact between the swinging rod and the egg. There is a problem that the eggs pushed by the moving rod cannot be shocked because they may come into contact with other eggs and be damaged, so that the eggs cannot be pushed well and it takes time to clear the clog.

Furthermore, the eggs transported by the egg collection conveyor may be transported biased to the left, right, or center of the conveyor. If it does so, since a hen egg will be biased to a specific channel | path, it will be in the state which a hen egg does not flow to another channel | path, and the area where a hen egg does not exist on an endless roller conveyor will arise. When a section where the egg does not flow is generated on the endless roller conveyor, there is a problem that the amount of the egg transported by the endless roller conveyor per unit time is reduced and cleaning and drying cannot be performed efficiently.

In recent years, an apparatus for sorting and packaging eggs has been increased in speed so that it can process hundreds of thousands of eggs per hour. If the processing amount per hour is reduced due to a section where no egg exists on the endless roller conveyor due to clogging of the egg aligning device or the like, it becomes impossible to produce packed eggs as planned. Therefore, there is a need for an egg aligning device that can align eggs at even intervals without damaging the eggs and continuously transfer them onto an endless roller conveyor.

An egg alignment apparatus according to the present invention is an egg alignment apparatus that aligns and conveys eggs that are conveyed at irregular intervals from upstream to the downstream, and includes a conveyance unit that conveys eggs and the conveyance A guide for guiding the chicken eggs at equal intervals in the width direction of the transport unit, and a guide unit that is adjacent to a downstream side of the stop unit, and that guides the eggs. And an alignment partition that aligns the eggs at the same interval.
Here, the upstream indicates the upstream side with respect to the transport direction of the transport portion of the egg aligning apparatus, and the downstream indicates the downstream side with respect to the transport direction of the transport section of the egg aligner. . Moreover, the width direction of a conveyance part has shown the direction orthogonal to the conveyance direction of a conveyance part.
According to the egg aligning apparatus according to the present invention, it becomes difficult for the eggs to become clogged at the entrance of the passage formed by the alignment partition. In addition, since the eggs are dispersed in the width direction of the transport unit by the stopping portion, the eggs are not biased in a specific passage, and a section where no eggs exist on the endless roller conveyor is less likely to occur.

Moreover, the said guide part has the narrow part formed in the position adjacent to the said stop part, and the wide part formed in the downstream of the said narrow part.
Since the guide portion has a narrow portion and a wide portion, the egg is regulated so as to pass through the center of the passage formed by the alignment partition portion, thereby preventing contact between the egg and the upstream tip of the alignment partition portion. be able to.

According to the egg alignment apparatus which concerns on this invention, since it can align at equal intervals, preventing damage to a egg, productivity can be improved.

It is a top view which shows the principal part of the egg alignment apparatus which concerns on this invention. It is the side view which looked at the egg alignment apparatus of FIG. 1 from the A direction. It is a top view which shows the modification of the egg alignment apparatus of FIG. It is a top view which shows the modification of the 1st stop part of FIG. 3, and a 2nd stop part.

Hereinafter, the Example of the egg alignment apparatus which concerns on this invention is described concretely with reference to drawings.

First, the configuration of the egg alignment apparatus according to the present invention will be described.
As shown in FIG. 1 and FIG. 2, the egg alignment apparatus according to the present invention includes a transport unit 1 that transports eggs E in the X direction, and a stopping unit 2 that stops the eggs E transported by the transport unit 1 while dispersing them. And the guide part 3 that guides the eggs E adjacent to the downstream side of the stop part 2 and over the stop part 2 so as to be evenly spaced in the width direction of the transport part 1, and the transport part 1 by the guide part 3 The partitioning part 4 which arranges the hen's egg E conveyed at equal intervals in the width direction of is provided. The eggs E are transferred from the conveyor for egg collection to the transfer unit 1 of the egg aligning apparatus, transferred in the X direction, aligned at equal intervals, and transferred again to the endless roller conveyor 6 provided downstream.

The transport unit 1 is a mesh conveyor, and the egg E can freely roll on the transport surface of the transport unit 1. In this embodiment, the mesh material constituting the transport surface of the transport unit 1 is made of synthetic resin. However, the mesh material is not limited to synthetic resin as long as it can roll freely on the transport surface.

The stop 2 is a synthetic resin plate having a width of 10 mm and a thickness of 1.5 mm, and is in contact with the transport surface of the transport unit 1 so as to be orthogonal to the X direction, which is the transport direction of the eggs E, or It is attached to the transport unit 1 in a slightly floating state, and the egg E transported by the transport unit 1 is stopped. The eggs E that have reached the stopping part 2 remain in the stopping part 2, and the other eggs E conveyed one after another from the upstream come into contact with the eggs E stopped in the stopping part 2, and the width direction of the conveying part 1. It is dispersed while moving sideways and stays in the stopping part 2, but when the egg E is further conveyed from the upstream, the egg E staying in the stopping part 2 by the pressure of the egg E crosses the stopping part 2 . The stopping part 2 temporarily stops the egg E so that the stopping part 2 can be surmounted by the pressure of another egg E conveyed from the upstream. Therefore, the optimal value for the thickness of the retaining portion 2 is 1 to 2 mm.

As a modification of the stopping part 2, as shown in FIG. 3, the stopping part 2 may be divided into a first stopping part 20 and a second stopping part 21. Eggs E that have not been fully dispersed in the width direction in the first stopping part 20 and have passed over the first stopping part 20 can be further dispersed in the width direction of the transport part 1 by the second stopping part 21.

Moreover, as another modification of the stop part 2, as shown in FIG. 4, the 1st stop part 22 curved so that the upstream of the X direction which is the conveyance direction of the egg E might become concave, and a 1st stop You may use the 2nd stop part 23 provided in the downstream of the part 22, and curved so that the upstream of the X direction might become convex. By making the 1st stop part 22 and the 2nd stop part 23 into such a shape, the egg E which has been transported biased from the upstream to either the left side or the right side is transferred to the width of the transport part 1 by the first stop part 22. Eggs E collected at the center of the direction and over the first stop 22 can be evenly dispersed in the width direction of the transport unit 1 by the second transport unit 23.

The guide part 3 is a plate made of synthetic resin having a width of 20 mm and a thickness of 1.5 mm. As shown in FIG. A plurality of sheets are attached so as to be adjacent to the downstream side of the stopping portion 2 with an interval. The eggs E that have passed over the stopping part 2 are transported in the X direction while being guided by the guide part 3 so as to be evenly spaced in the width direction of the transport part 1.

As a modified example of the guide unit 3, a guide unit 30 can be used as shown in FIG. The guide part 30 has a narrow part 31 formed at a position adjacent to the second stopping part 21 and a wide part 32 formed on the downstream side of the narrow part 31, and the width of the wide part 32 is The width of the guide portion 3 shown in FIG.

By having the wide part 32, the movement of the egg E transferred between the guide parts 30 in the width direction of the transfer part 1 is restricted. Further, the wide portion 32 is formed with a straight portion along the X direction which is the conveying direction of the egg E, and the movement of the egg E can be stabilized, so that the egg E is at the upstream end of the alignment partition 4. There is no direct contact, and damage to the egg E can be prevented.

In this embodiment, the width of the guide portion 30 is changed by providing the narrow portion 31 and the wide portion 32, but the guide portion 30 is slightly inclined so that the center is a mountain, and the inclination angle is If the egg E rolls in a specific direction by gradually changing the angle, it is possible to obtain the same effect as when the narrow part 31 and the wide part 32 such as the guide part 30 of this embodiment are provided. .

The alignment partition portion 4 is a synthetic resin partition plate having a width of 10 mm and a height of 80 mm, and has the same interval as the guide portion 3 guides the chicken eggs E conveyed by the guide portion 3 at equal intervals. It is attached to the downstream side of the guide part 3 so that it may align with a space | interval.

The transfer plate 5 is a plate for transferring the eggs E aligned by the alignment partitioning section 4 to the endless roller conveyor 6, and is attached so as to have an inclination that gently falls in the X direction, which is the direction in which the eggs are transported. It has been.

The endless roller conveyor 6 is an endless conveyor that conveys the egg E between two cylindrical rollers, and conveys the egg E in the X direction at equal intervals. The endless roller conveyor 6 is provided with a direction alignment portion 7 for aligning the blunt end and the sharp end of the egg E. In this embodiment, a cylindrical roller is used to perform direction alignment on the endless roller conveyor 6, but if the direction alignment is not performed on the endless roller conveyor 6, a zipped roller may be used.

Next, operation | movement of the egg alignment apparatus of this invention is demonstrated.
As shown in FIG. 1, the egg E transferred from the conveyer for egg collection to the conveying unit 1 of the egg aligning apparatus is conveyed in the X direction. At this time, the eggs E are transported at irregular intervals. The egg E that has been transported in the X direction is stopped by the stop 2.

Since the transport unit 1 is a mesh conveyor made of synthetic resin, the chicken egg E can freely roll on the transport unit 1. Then, the other egg E conveyed from the upstream side of the egg E stopped by the stopping part 2 moves in the lateral direction in contact with the stopped egg E and is stopped by the stopping part 2. It is done.

Similarly, the eggs E conveyed one after another from the upstream are stopped by the stop 2 while being dispersed in the width direction of the transfer unit 1. When the egg E is further conveyed from the upstream, the egg E that is retained in the retaining part 2 by the pressure of the egg E passes over the retaining part 2.

The eggs E that have passed over the stopping part 2 are guided by the guide part 3 so as to be evenly spaced in the width direction of the transport part 1 and transported in the X direction. The egg E is transported to the passage formed by the alignment partition 4 as it is because the movement of the transport unit 1 in the width direction is restricted by the guide unit 3.

The chicken egg E reaches the transfer plate 5 when it is further conveyed in the X direction through the passage formed by the alignment partition 4. The eggs E that have reached the transfer plate 5 are transferred to the endless roller conveyor 6. The endless roller conveyor 6 conveys the egg E between the two cylindrical rollers in the X direction. At this time, the eggs E are intermittently transferred to the endless roller conveyor 6, so that the eggs E that have been transported are accumulated in the passage formed by the alignment partitions 4.

If the speed of accumulation in the passage formed by the alignment partition 4 is faster than the speed at which the egg E is transferred to the endless roller conveyor 6, the egg E that can no longer enter the passage passes between the guide portion 3 and the alignment partition 4. You can move through to the next passage.

The egg E conveyed in the X direction by the endless roller conveyor 6 is aligned in the direction of the sharp end and the blunt end by the direction aligning section 7, and further passes through a cleaning / drying process provided downstream, and is subjected to dirt, cracks, etc. Packed through an inspection process for inspection and a selection process for selecting eggs for each size, they are packed and shipped to a retail store.

Next, the operation of the egg alignment apparatus according to the modification shown in FIG. 3 will be described.
The egg E transported from the upstream is stopped by the first stop 20. The other eggs E transported from the upstream side of the eggs E stopped by the first stop 20 move in the lateral direction in contact with the eggs E stopped and are moved by the first stop 20. To be stopped.

Similarly, the eggs E conveyed from upstream one after another are stopped by the first stop 20 while being dispersed in the width direction of the transfer unit 1. When the egg E is further conveyed from the upstream, the egg E that is retained in the first retaining part 20 by the pressure of the egg E passes over the first retaining part 20.

The egg E that has passed over the first stop 20 is further conveyed in the X direction and is stopped by the second stop 21. The other eggs E transported from the upstream side of the eggs E stopped by the second stopping unit 21 move in the lateral direction in contact with the eggs E stopped and are stopped by the second stopping unit 21. Be made. At this time, in the first stop 20, the bias of the eggs E that could not be dispersed can be eliminated by the second stop 21, and the eggs E that are conveyed over the first stop 20 one after another are transported. Due to the pressure, the egg E that has been stopped at the second stop 21 moves over the second stop 21.

The eggs E that have passed over the second stop 21 are guided by the guide 30 so as to be evenly spaced in the width direction of the transport unit 1. Since the guide part 30 has the narrow part 31 formed at a position adjacent to the second stop part 21, the egg E that has passed over the second stop part 21 is guided along the narrow part 31. It is conveyed in the X direction while gathering at the center of the passage formed by the section 30. Thereafter, the movement of the egg E in the width direction of the conveying unit 1 is restricted by the wide portion 32, so that the egg E does not directly contact the upstream tip of the aligning partition 4, and goes directly to the passage formed by the aligning partition 4. Be transported.

Next, the operation of the egg alignment apparatus according to the modification shown in FIG. 4 will be described.
The egg E transported from the upstream is stopped by the first stop 22. At this time, the egg E is moved and stopped so as to be gathered along the curve of the first stopping unit 22 so as to gather in the center of the transport unit 1.

Eggs E that are transported from the upstream one after another are stopped by the first stop 22 while gathering at the center in the width direction of the transport 1. When the egg E is further conveyed from the upstream, the egg E that is retained in the first retaining part 22 by the pressure of the egg E passes over the first retaining part 22.

The egg E that has passed over the first stop 22 is further conveyed in the X direction and is stopped by the second stop 23. At this time, the eggs E are moved and stopped so as to be distributed along the curve of the second stopping part 23 so as to be distributed to the left side and the right side of the transport part 1. Due to the pressure of the egg E that is transported over the first stop 22 one after another, the egg E stopped at the second stop 23 passes over the second stop 23.

Even if the eggs E are transported by the transport unit 1 by any bias by the first stop 22, the eggs can be collected in the transport direction center of the transport unit 1, and the eggs collected in the transport direction center of the transport unit 1. E can be evenly distributed in the width direction of the transport unit 1 by the second stopping unit 23.

In addition, the effect described in the Example of this invention only enumerated the most suitable effect resulting from this invention, and the effect by this invention is not limited to what was described in the Example of this invention.

DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 Transfer part 2 Stop part 3,30 Guide part 4 Alignment partition part 5 Transfer board 6 Endless roller conveyor 7 Directional alignment part 20,22 First stop part 21,23 Second stop part 31 Narrow part 32 Wide part E Egg

Claims (2)

An egg alignment apparatus that aligns and conveys eggs that are conveyed at irregular intervals from upstream to downstream,
A transport unit for transporting chicken eggs;
A stopping unit for stopping the eggs transported by the transport unit;
Adjacent to the downstream side of the stop portion, a guide portion that guides the eggs at equal intervals in the width direction of the transport portion;
An egg alignment apparatus comprising an alignment partition that aligns the eggs at the same intervals as the guides guide. The guide part is a narrow part formed at a position adjacent to the stop part,
The egg alignment apparatus according to claim 1 , further comprising a wide portion formed on a downstream side of the narrow portion.

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